Archive for October, 2002

blogbuster

I’ve been very slack at posting to this blog over the past few weeks. Most of that slackness is due to university study. However, normally I have some political comment to add. Like calling John Howard a buffoon or lambasting some crackpot right-wing dumbfuck.

I don’t know why I have found myself unable to gather the momentum to say something informed and intelligent (like Graham did yesterday). Basically, I feel like I don’t give a shit.

Have a look at the ‘most viewed articles’ on The Age website (bottom right corner). Each day most stories are about movie stars, who’s rooting who or Winona Ryder’s pathetic shoplifting attempt.

Judging by the content of the ‘most viewed articles’ it looks like nobody else gives a shit either. I don’t want to join that club.

red lorry yellow lorry

Bloggers block has struck. Somebody please give me something to rant about!

what’s on the menu

If you’ve ever wondered how to create a cascading menu, look no further than twinhelix.com. For a while now I’ve been admiring Shauny’s menu (on her blog) and was wondering how the hell it worked. In a word, javascript. Bastard. Now I have more to learn.

datsun 200b

Now that I’m suitably recovered from a big Saturday night out, I can inform you that The Datsuns are a pretty good band. The Casanovas weren’t too shabby either - as for The Specimens, I didn’t catch them…sorry.

My ears are still ringing but I suppose that’s inevitable when you stand next to a stack of Marshall amplifiers. I thought I learnt to stay well away from those things in my early twenties.

big black boots

The site that made me want to learn HTML and start writing an online journal is now being updated again. It’s called myboot.com. The guy who runs it didn’t update the site for over two years until last week. I’ve been checking for changes weekly/monthly and was pleasantly surprised to see several additions to the site.

If you have the time read the story he is in the middle of writing. It’s called “She hates my futon.” I read the first 23 chapters 2 years ago…needless to say I am hanging out for the concluding chapter. It had better be good if it’s been 2 years in the making.

what’s in a name

I was thinking. That’s unusual for me these days. I was thinking about the events of last year. The attack on the World Trade Center in New York has become known as “9-11.” What would’ve those events become known as if they happened on July the 11th. Surely it wouldn’t be called the “7-11″ attacks would it?

Yeah. OK. Back to work Tony!

ready mister music

A musical search engine is on the way.

Thought you might want to know that!

yobbo slobbo

Back in Melbourne now and isn’t it love-er-ley to come back to 11 degress at 930pm. Once again the food on the flight was shithouse but the in-flight entertainment was pretty good. A footy team was returning from it’s end of season trip to Airlie Beach on my flight. They were yobboish, but in a reasonable way. The old ladies in the row opposite me wouldn’t quite agree with that statement though.

Back to the grind.

bella bella

The Greens got their first seat in the house of the damned.

Since turning 18 I have been a staunch Labor voter until the last Victorian local council elections, where I helped the Green Party take half the council in the City of Yarra. Labor are nothing but an extension of the glib libs these days and some people will say that they have been since the late eighties.

Arrgh. It’s back to Melbourne this afternoon. This trip wasn’t long enough - didn’t get to see many people that I wanted to see (sorry Darren and Noel in Nambour). Nevermind, in six months there’ll be a wedding with free piss for you all to come to.

That’s it. I’m off to Caloundra for a few hours.

blogging for dummies

The humidity is getting bearable now. I suppose that if I ever moved back here (Brisbane) it would take a few weeks to get used to the wet and soggy air again.

The main point of coming up here has been sorted out. Bea and I have picked a place to have a piss up/mini-reception after the wedding next April. Watt, at the Powerhouse in New Farm. Looks OK and was reasonably priced for the facilities. It’s right on the Brisbane River (which is looking very clean these days) and next to New Farm Park, one of Brissy’s best gardens.

The Powerhouse is a pretty good looking setup. It’s an arts precinct. When I left Brisbane in 1996 performance art etc. was considered to be for fairies only. Brisbane has changed heaps. It must be on par with it’s bigger southern counterparts as far as cafés and overpriced bars go….per capita.

Ahh. One more lazy day, then it’s back to Melbourne.

I’ll have some photos from this weekend up sooner or later.

brisvegas

I have forgotten how oppressive humidity can be.

Right now I am taking advantage of one of the best moves I ever made in my short and uneventful time as a blogger. I am posting from Brisbane with the help of wonderful, wonderful moveable type.

The flight up was pretty cool. I had the good fortune to sit in the middle of the Victorian Kung-Fu Squad at the rear of my Qantas 767. What a lovely time that was with hairy blokes and their hairier wives getting all grasshoppery half way through the flight - you know, doing leg and arm exercises to make sure that their ‘temples’ were in good fighting shape.

Food. Shite. Caesar salad. Julius would have been so disappointed.

It’s the weather I don’t miss at all. Even though it’s 24 as I type, the humidity is getting me down. Ah well, it’s great to see the parents, my fox terrier, catch up with a few people and look for somewhere to have an informal reception/piss-up after I get myself married (April 12 2004).

Bea and I have decided to do the deed in Brisbane, even though we both live in Melbourne. This has eventuated mostly because just about everyone we know lives here and we want to have a couple of weeks break up here or in northern NSW after the wedding. I suppose that’s called a honeymoon.

home sweet home

Each time I try to do something at the front of my crappy weatherboard rental home, like mow the grass or wash my white van (which normally is coloured grey, depending on how much rain there’s been) or scratch my nuts on the front verandah, the old Greek man nextdoor (Arthur) always rounds me up for a chat.
Not that I hate it, he just always seems to do it when I want to get a mundane task done quickly.

In the 8 months I have lived here (Northcote, Melbourne) I have learnt all about this man and unusually for me, actually listened to what he has to say. When I tell him that I’ll never own a house he says to me, “Bullashit moit, I bought thisa house for $7000 in 1971 and now it’s worth $350 000. You know what I a made back in 1971, I tell you my young man friend, I work 12 hour a day, 5 day a week for $25.” After hearing that I was surprised.

He offered me an explanation for why it was that not many younger people can buy a house these days. “I tella you, there is tooa much to spend the money on, mobile phones, stupid internet and cable a-television. Who pay for television? Pay to watch shit on the tele. Fuckinga bullashit!”

Maybe he’s right. Maybe nowdays we have turned into consumers of the best kind, living for the moment and not for our future.

Listen to me! Fuck me dead, you can’t half tell I’ve just turned bloody thirty. I’m starting to sound like the man nextdoor.